


the art of simping as perfected by one miya atsumu

by duravis



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: (Simping), AtsuHina Week 2020, Fluff, Getting Together, Hell Yea AtsuHina Are In Love: Brazil Edition, Kissing, M/M, Mutual Pining, Post-Time Skip
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-08
Updated: 2020-06-08
Packaged: 2021-03-04 01:42:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,352
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24565582
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/duravis/pseuds/duravis
Summary: JUNE 08, 2019 (21h05): AREA MAN FALLS IN LOVE WITH THE SUN, NEARLY DROWNS AFTER DISCOVERING THAT THE SUN LOVES HIM BACK.> AtsuHina Week Day 3: D̶o̶m̶e̶s̶t̶i̶c̶ / Mutual Pining
Relationships: Hinata Shouyou/Miya Atsumu
Comments: 17
Kudos: 159





	the art of simping as perfected by one miya atsumu

**Author's Note:**

> technically it's still day 3 where i am so. *sweats* enjoy

It goes without saying that Miya Atsumu has never been to Brazil.

As a matter of fact, he’s never even been out of the country. Only a very select few know that he’ is deathly afraid of flying. (Which is ironic, for someone who falls in love watching people do it everyday).

But it also goes without saying that Atsumu is a fool, a fool in love to make matters worse, so naturally he pocketed the fear the minute he purchased a round trip ticket to Brazil during the one week they had off from training.  
  
By the time they were lifting off, he was desperately trying to ground himself just as the very ground beneath him stretched further and further away. He closed his eyes and took a couple of deep breaths and distantly remembered Samu’s words to him, uttered minutes before he left for the airport this morning. “ _Yer more likely to get eaten by a shark when yer out swimmin’ on the beach than die in a plane crash, idiot,”_ he had claimed _,_ which, for the record, _wasn’t_ true, Atsumu looked it up the at the terminal and the odds definitely _weren’t_ better at all but—  
  
There was a light pressure encircling his right hand, and when he opened his eyes, he was met with the sight of Hinata Shouyou smiling at him while whispering, softly, reassuringly, “ _It’s okay. You’re okay.”_  
  
But the words entered his ears all muffled, like they were spoken underwater—or perhaps from an incredibly far distance—because Atsumu’s soul was propelled approximately 100 meters into the air the moment he felt the heat molecules transfer from Shouyou’s palm to his. And at that moment, Shouyou was looking at him, and Atsumu was looking back, and Shouyou was _holding_ his _hand_ and _God, I’m gonna have a heart attack and die on this plane before it even has the chance to crash._  
  
The memory is one that floods back to him all at once, even after being safely landed in Rio for a week, simply because his anxiety hasn’t lessened much since. During these past few days he’s found out how nerve-wracking it is to speak and have no one understand what you’re trying to say. Or hearing words and phrases and jokes all around you, but not knowing for a single second what any of it means. Shouyou’s a good translator, though; Atsumu’s not sure how he managed to spend two years here by his lonesome without losing half his mind in the process.  
  
But Shouyou’s a monster, a restless soul, and Atsumu knows that he can do anything he sets his mind to. It’s that simple. Shouyou takes all that life throws at him and asks for more— _one more toss, higher, faster, more… And now,_ please _, do it all over again._

And when Japan didn’t have all that he wanted, all that he _craved_ , he traveled across the world to snatch it straight out of the earth’s core.  
  
He looks at Shouyou, whose gaze is now fixed on the line where the ocean meets the sky, and thinks: _I traveled across the world for what I wanted, too._  
  
 _What a couple of monsters we are._  
  
“Atsumu-san?” Shouyou calls out, which breaks Atsumu out of his reverie as quickly as he fell into it.  
  
“Ah, Shouyou-kun, er—yes?”  
  
“Are you alright? You were looking at me pretty intensely there.” There’s a half smile on his face, one barely illuminated by the blue glow of the sky an hour after the sun went down, and Atsumu reckons it’s one of the most beautiful sights he’s ever seen.  
  
 _“Stop bein’ a goddam simp, ‘Tsumu_ ,” he hears his brother scorn from eighteen-thousand kilometers away.  
  
“Oh. Was I? Sorry. ‘M fine,” he says, all at once.  
  
Shouyou laughs, and it’s a symphony orchestra in his ears.  
  
 _“I don’ even know what that word means, ‘Samu_ ,” he had shouted back, _“but I’m definitely not whatever a ‘simp’ is!_ ”  
  
One trip to Google and, _yeah, okay, maybe I am. Shoot me.  
_  
Goosebumps bud within the follicles on his arms and spread along the underside of his open beach shirt and shorts. The wind from the shore is unwavering, every passing breeze threading through the short tufts of Shouyou’s hair.  
  
 _Who wouldn’t be._  
  
“So, how have you liked Rio, Atsumu-san?” Shouyou asks, discarding another comfortable silence they’ve managed to sustain. Atsumu finds that he doesn’t mind at all.  
  
“’S nice,” he says, automatically. “Hot,” he adds, and Shouyou smiles and nods at that. “And the people here are... Very accommodatin’. Even if we don’ got much in common. And if we did, ‘s not like we could let each other in on it, ya know?  
  
“But they’re nice. Warm as the weather. Least, yer beach friends are. And the ones at the bar.”  
  
“I notice you haven’t mentioned Pedro,” Shouyou comments.

Atsumu clicks his tongue. “See, I jus’ don’ think he likes me all that much. He’s sure fond of you, yea, but whenever _I_ try an’ talk to him, ‘s all ‘Yes.’ this ‘Okay.’ that,” he explains, only slightly exaggerating the monotony of his voice.  
  
“Atsumu-san, you’ve got to understand he speaks even less Japanese than I do Portuguese—”  
  
“Don’ mean he’s got’ta be all stoic all the time! ‘S like I’m talkin’ to my old coach,” Atsumu remarks. He cringes at the thought.  
  
“Yes, well, he’s nervous. Talking to a native speaker in a language you can barely introduce yourself in is incredibly intimidating,” Shouyou defends, and Atsumu’s half-willing to be a smartass back just so he can continue hearing Shouyou tell him off like that. “Trust me, I know.”  
  
Atsumu decides, surprisingly, not to be an ass. “Yea, yer right.”  
  
He reckons that Shouyou’s very much aware that he can’t win in an argument against him. Shouyou _is_ his weak point, after all, whether he’s aware of that particular part or not. “Always are,” he adds, without a hint of insincerity.  
  
A beat passes as the two get lost in their surroundings, the rising tide barely lapping against their toes every couple of seconds. If they keep sitting where they’re at, it’s bound to crawl up to their asses and soak through their clothes. But Atsumu doesn’t feel any obligation to move in the slightest.  
  
Shouyou speaks up again. “And Heitor and Nice? You liked them too, yeah?”  
  
Atsumu nods aggressively. “Heitor’s a fun guy. Really fun guy. Good time to be around.”  
  
“...And Nice?”  
  
“She’s friendly.”

Shoyou looks apprehensive, and _ack_ – “...You didn’t mind her flirting with you, right?”  
  
“Her fiancé was right there!” Atsumu exclaims, gesturing wildly in multiple directions at once. “What’s a guy supposed to do in that situation?”  
  
And Shouyou seems mildly entertained by the outburst, which really only serves to further frustrate Atsumu. “That’s just how Nice _is_ , Astumu-san. She appreciates a guy whose tall and handsome, y’know, but she’s still undoubtedly committed to Heitor,” He explains. “They’re very in love.”

Shouyou looks down at the sand with some kind of _look_ on his face, one that Atsumu doesn’t think he’s ever seen, one that might take the cake for being the first of Shouyou’s looks that he’s not immensely fond of.

Shouyou is unaware of any and all of Atsumu’s inner crises. He drags his ring finger through the sand. “She proposed to him, after all,” he adds.  
  
Atsumu decides looking away from Shouyou right now is within his best interests. “Yea, maybe that’s fine with her an’ all, but I didn’t want to end up with a black eye, ‘specially after all the progress Heitor and I made bondin’ over... Uh, tuna.”  
  
Shouyou laughs at that, and suddenly the peace is restored, the camellias are in full bloom, the orchestras resume their symphonies in Atsumu’s ears. “Figured you two would. It’s why you guys always smell so fishy.” Atsumu jabs him in the side with an elbow, but the impact is harmless.

“And if it makes you feel better, Heitor told me he was definitely not afraid of _you_ trying to run off with his fiancée.”  
  
Atsumu stiffens. “...Why does that sound like some kinda dig at me.”  
  
“Because you’re terribly self-conscious, Atsumu-san.”  
  
“Hey!”  
  
“See what I mean.”  
  
And Atsumu has nothing to say to that because he’s definitely _not_ self-conscious and he doesn’t always _need_ the last word, and he idly wonders what about being in Brazil with Shouyou has put him so on edge. He wonders this, though his traitor of a heart is very aware of the answer.

Being here, in Brazil, in _Rio de Janeiro_ , on the beach Shouyou played volleyball on for _two years_ after graduating high school, feels like he’s crossed into some private territory of Shouyou’s life—something sacred to _him_ —and it all feels more intimate than anything he’d ever signed up for. He knew what to expect when he agreed to flying with Shouyou to Brazil and letting him share this crazy, unbelievable haze of a week with him. He knew what he was getting himself into. He knew that the ache in his heart, the one that first surfaced during their fateful match at Nationals, would only swell and grow and fester into a cavity the more time they spent together.

(He and his twin both developed a cavity when they were thirteen. The dentist fixed his brother’s with a silver filling, and his with gold. Every time he sees Shouyou’s own smile, he feels it cracking through the mold.)

He knew all of these things from the very beginning. He prays that the gods will key him in on why he would ever agree. But it was an easy decision, unlike most others where Hinata Shouyou is involved.

(Shouyou had asked him, simply, off-handed, “D’ya wanna come with me?”  
  
Atsumu had replied, blindly, blinded, “Yes.”)  
  
He wonders if he’d have this intrusive feeling, too, if he ever were to meet Shouyou’s family, for whatever reason the event calls for.  
  
(He dismisses that thought quicker than any quick-set he’s ever tossed.)

Shouyou is, once again, completely oblivious to Atsumu’s emotional turmoil. It is a beautiful thing. Shouyou is beside him, silent, face soft and calm and composed like that of a statue carved from the fire that broke off from the sun and drifted down to the earth. He is a beautiful thing.

“Have you ever been in love, Atsumu-san?”

He is a stupid little punk and Atsumu never wants to look at him again.

“Have I e’er been… In love?” He repeats, and it even sounds stupid to his own ears.

Shouyou just nods.

“I. I don’ know,” he answers, which sounds more or less fair to his own ears. Perhaps he’s just infatuated by Shouyou. Perhaps that’s what it’s been these past seven years.

“I think you’re lying,” Shouyou says, which, _wow, uncalled for._

Atsumu figures there’s no point in debating the matter. “What makes ya think that?”

“You’re not one to give an, ‘I don’t know’ answer that easily. If you really didn’t know, you’d probably make up some story about how you _totally_ were with some girl from America a few years back, or something,” Shouyou points out. Atsumu doesn’t particularly like being read like this. “That and your face is, like, really red right now, Atsumu-san.”

It’s only then that Atsumu realizes Shouyou has been looking at _him_ the whole time he’s just been looking at the mundane sight of his feet in the water. The thought ties his stomach in knots and he wants to astral project out of his skin immediately. He is regrettably unable to do so.

“Ight, okay, ya got me. I’m– I’ve been in love, ” he admits. “How about yerself? Anyone capture the heart of Hinata Shouyou? God save ‘em.” He prays his desperate attempt at shifting the spotlight off of himself isn’t as obvious as it is.

“Hmmm,” Shouyou hums, pensive, and _argh, cute._ “Loads of times, yeah. I pretty much wear my heart on my sleeve.” And he says that so lightly that Atsumu knows it’s hurt him heavily in the past.

The confession sort of surprises Atsumu. He’s always envisioned Shouyou as the type to never let himself be chained down by anything or anyone, meaning romantic endeavors were off the table completely. But he supposes everyone is human, even those who practically border on being a deity, and therefore not immune to matters of the heart. Even so, one would not simply “catch” Hinata Shouyou if he were to fall for you. The boy has wings for a reason.

“I’d ask who, but ‘m pretty sure ya would jus’ start listin’ off every volleyball you’ve ever owned,” Atsumu jests, except he’s more than half serious. He’d found out from Pedro (on that fateful night when they were all a _little_ bit more than tipsy off caipirinhas) that Shouyou slept beside his volleyball on nights when he was particularly homesick. Sometimes they’d even spoon. The image alone makes his heart burst and ache at the same time.

Shouyou snorts at the comment. How can a snort of all things sound so pleasant. God save _him_. “You’d be right about that, too.”

The smile on his face fades slowly, just as the expansive sky fades from blue to black. It’s getting progressively more difficult to discern Shouyou’s features against the evening settling in around them. There’s dim lamppost a couple meters behind them, however, which makes the shine in his eyes impossible to miss.

“Sometimes I wish I didn’t have to. Love everything, I mean. So deeply. Especially when I’m just… Setting myself up to be disappointed, I guess.”

“Disappointed?”

“Mh,” Shouyou affirms. “I’m not sure if all that I love will ever have enough love for me in return.”

And Atsumu tries to keep his gaping at that admission strictly internal. How could anyone _not_ love Hinata Shouyou? How could anything in nature’s kingdom _not_ be enamored by the sun, when it provides the land with so much warmth and life and hope? How, when his smiles make camellias bloom, when his laughter plays the flutes and strings for the world’s symphony?

But Atsumu doesn’t verbalize any of this. That would be ridiculous.

“I love you,” is what comes out instead.

He wishes at that moment that the god of the sea would emerge from the coastline beneath their feet, raise his trident, and spear Atsumu directly through the heart. Perhaps he could also then retreat with Atsumu’s body still hooked, and descend once more into the deep from which he came, just so he could be spared from seeing Shouyou’s face as he lay dying atop the sand.

But none of that happens. As a matter of fact, nothing at all happens for a good thirty seconds, give or take, but then Shouyou blinks once. And then once more.

“Oh,” he says, after a minute, after a millennium. “You do? Like, really?”

Atsumu can only find it in him to nod.

“Oh,” Shouyou says again.

Shouyou holds his face in his left hand, half-covering his mouth. He’s staring directly at a shell on the ground but somehow Atsumu can still feel his gaze settled directly upon himself.

“I guess I love you too, then,” he says, which are the words that effectively put Atsumu in a coma, rush him to the emergency room, and then proceed to lower his body down into an early grave in a matter of milliseconds.

“You– Huh?” Atsumu stutters, and he can’t believe that Shouyou is actually _laughing_ at him right now, the bastard–

“I love you. I think I have for a while now, actually. Being here with you in Rio this week has… Really only made that more. Apparent,” Shouyou clarifies, but Atsumu realistically isn’t able to process anything past the initial, ‘ _I_ _love you_ ’.

And he’s not done, for the love of all things holy, he isn’t. “I didn’t want to tell you because… Well, I like the way things are between us now. I didn’t want to go messing that up just because I couldn’t get over the way your hair looks in the morning before you style it, or something…”

At this point he doesn’t quite care whether Shouyou is done speaking or not. A man has his limits. “Shou-kun, ya have got’ta stop talkin’, I–”

Atsumu turns his torso almost violently away from him before he _faints_ or something equally mortifying, only retaining stability by uselessly gripping at the sand. The sand seeps between his fingers and around the stark white of his knuckles. He doesn’t feel stable at all.

“Atsumu-san? Are you o–”

“Yeah, I’m– Uh, hold on,” Atsumu says, and he’s kicking up at wet sand and rising to his feet before his mind is even made aware of the movement. He’s moving _forward_ , he’s moving _away_ , he’s found that the whole ‘out of sight, out of mind’ tactic tends to help him in situations like these; he has to depart immediately and no part of his deep-fried brain cares if that means taking an evening swim.

“Atsumu-san!” Shouyou yells, but the sound doesn’t echo through ears decidedly deaf to the voice. He’s already waist deep in water, wading through it like there’s no current pushing against him, like there’s no shiver up his spine as the coldness of it inches up his skin.

Because it is _weirdly fuckin’ cold_ for shoreline on the coast of South America, and he idly wonders if he’ll end up drowning in it if he keeps moving at the pace that he is. _‘Samu really thought if I’d set one foot in the water, chances are I’d get eaten alive by a shark, huh? Well, I’ll bet in return that ‘Samu never considered my cause of death on this trip bein’ Hinata fuckin’ Shouyou decidin’ to admit that he fuckin’ lo–_

“ _Atsumu!_ ” Shouyou calls out, with no honorific at all (and it’s the first time he’s ever heard his name come out of Shouyou’s mouth sounding like _that_ –), and suddenly that’s all it takes for him to halt his movement mid-step. His feet sink into the sand where he stands, Shouyou’s hand wraps around his forearm like a campfire in a snowstorm, and the déjà vu of it all makes him feel awfully dizzy.

“Atsumu,” he says again, and it’s so gentle that Atsumu wants to ingrain the sound into his memory, tattoo it across his chest, bury it deep inside his heart.

He kisses Shouyou and it tastes dreadfully salty, a firm reminder that both of them are presently up to their chests in water.

They’re up to their chests in water, but when Atsumu cradles a wet hand up to Shouyou’s face and feels the warmth of it turning droplets into steam, well… He reckons they’re up to their chests in love, too.

* * *

“Are you gonna be okay?”

Contrary to unpopular belief, no amount of kissing they’ve done in the past 12 hours can alleviate the stress induced by being ten thousand meters in the air.

“Yea, ‘course I am.”

“…Are you sure?”

A signal beeps to let the passengers aboard know that they must now buckle their seatbelts and turn off any and all electronic devices. Atsumu grips Shouyou’s hand like a vice.

“When will God tire of testin’ me all the damn time.”

Shouyou grins into his shoulder. Astumu feels himself burning up. Once they’re in the atmosphere, he could be classified as an asteroid.

“You did it a week ago, what’s different now?”

“Nothin’. Me. Us.”

Atsumu relaxes the muscles in his neck. He lets his head falls atop Shouyou’s.

“Think ‘m gonna take a nap,” he decides, just as the whirring of the plane becomes harder to ignore.

“Mm, okay,” Shouyou acknowledges. “I’ll be here when you wake up.”

Atsumu knows that there isn’t really anywhere else he could go, besides the bathroom or maybe on a walk across the wings if he was feeling particularly unhinged. But Atsumu believes him, though not because of any of that.

Atsumu believes him, simply because he wasn’t made to do anything else.

**Author's Note:**

> can you tell i read too much perennials. can you tell. 
> 
> twitter (still don't know how this app works please treat me kindly): [glocksgenya](https://twitter.com/glocksgenya)  
> tumblr: [tatakaedrey](https://tatakaedrey.tumblr.com/)


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